BLACK SUN (1964)

黒い太陽

dir: Koreyoshi Kurahara

Nikkatsu

April 19, 1964

95 minutes B&W Widescreen

Tamio Kawaji as Akira

Chico Roland as Gill

Yuko Chishiro as Yuki

Tamio Kawaji is back as Akira from ’The Warped Ones', squatting in an old abandoned building and grooving out to jazz records. His black friend Gill is also back (Chico Roland), only this time they don’t know each other (maybe this is a prequel?), and he’s a disturbed war vet with a machine gun who holds Akira hostage. Akira’s female prostitute friend Yuki is here too (Yuko Chishiro), as he tricks her into having sex, despite actually being broke - but it’s a small part as this is very much a ‘dude’ movie.

It’s about Akira’s idealized version of ‘black’ people, because of his love for jazz vs the reality, which is that no one is representative of their whole race. It gets preachy at times, and it has some racially charged situations (Akira wearing ‘blackface’ and making Gill wear ‘whiteface’), but it’s primarily a product of it’s times. It has it’s moments - Gill playing trumpet while a crowd of Japanese faces crowd around to watch, while thoughts of the civil rights atrocities flash around in his head…but an hour and a half of just these two over acting is just a little too much for me.

If you're curious about 'Chico' Roland who plays Gill, he had an interesting career as a black man in Japanese films during this period, and here's some info on him: Chico Roland Info